ReadyNAS Ultra 6 - Replace OS with any linux distro or NAS-OS e.g. Openmediavault possible?

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Z4IcHt6N7smgz2X wrote:

Probably interessting for anybody:

I can mount my Netgear X-RAID in Openmediavault without any problems...

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There are several flavors of X-RAID.  Was this array built on a 4.2.x ReadyNAS?

If Netgear ever stops updating ReadyNAS OS6 or makes it incompatible with my legacy NAS, Openmediavault does sound interesting over pure Linux.

Were you able to find the article about Ultra6 conversion pointed to in their forum thread?  It seems to be gone (not surprising since it's 7 years old).  Of course, being that old, much may be out of date.

Do you boot from the internal flash, or were you able to leave that intact in case you ever want to move back?  If you are booting from it and that does a lot of writes to it, you may have problems in the future -- it was designed for read-mostly use.

That your NAS has VGA capability (with the right cable) is clearly a plus here.  Though most (maybe all) ReadyNAS have a serial console port, the pin-out and voltage levels are not consistent between models and is not easy to implement, so users with machines without VGA capability will find this more difficult.

As for the 10-pin header.  Two rows of 5?  All pins are populated, or one is missing for keying?  My Ultra6 is in storage, so I can't look and the only photo I found on the net isn't clear enough to see the labeling.  If it's two rows of 5 with one missing, my guess would be an internal USB or RS-232 port, depending on which pin is missing.  If it's all 10 pins, it could still be RS-232.  Google the pin-out of those connectors and check for the voltages and grounds.  RS-232 is a bit harder to ID with a volt meter, especially since there are two different "standards", but any 12V on it would indicate that's a probability.  Of course, it could be used only for factory test.

"JP" is normally used to indicate a set of "JumPer" pins, not a connector, so the other may be factory use only.

You can mount a ReadyNAS on any Linux machine, including another ReadyNAS.  I run OwnCloud on a Pro2 but have some shares on my main NAS mounted as read-only on the Ultra2 and then available in OwnCloud.  I may be fooling myself, but I figure that's an added layer of protection for the main NAS since the shares are exported via NFS as read-only.  Even hacking the Pro2 should not directly expose my main NAS.

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Z4IcHt6N7smgz2X wrote:
I thought this could be useful for somebody who want to rescue the data without buying a new Netgear device or spare parts for the Ultra 6.

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Certainly it could be. But it might not work for ReadyNAS that run OS-6 (and many Ultras have been converted to OS-6), so I thought I'd get clarification.

However, it is possible to mount the OS-6 volumes in linux too, as they do use standard mdadm and btrfs.

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Z4IcHt6N7smgz2X wrote:
Ok I thought Netgears X-RAID is something special and you could only rescue the data with a new Netgear device

It's not proprietary - systems running 4.2, 5.3, and 6.x firmware all use standard software RAID (either lvm or mdadm).  XRAID is application software on top of those tools which simplifies RAID managment, and automates expansion.

The original 4.1 (Sparc) systems are a bit different.  They have some acceleration hardware, and run RAID-4.  Even those arrays can be mounted in linux systems though.

Thanks for this.  Keep us informed of any solutions you find to the issues you mention. 

Adding some formatting to the section on the LCD display for readability in case the referenced article ever disappears:

The LCD module on the ReadyNAS (Ultra/Pro series) shows up in Illumos/Solaris as a serial port device. On my systems, it is always described as /dev/term/b

Here are the commands currently available for font/bitmaps development to be sent to the serial port:

Value      Outcome
C X Y     ­ Set x, y coordinates (0 <= x <= 127, 0 <= y <= 33). Hex only, example c40 10, set x=64 y=16.
E          Clear screen
F N        ­Set font size. N=(0:Ariel 9, 1:Ariel 18, 2:Mono58)
L string ­  Display the string, starting from (x, y)
B h w b    Set height,width,bitmap, starting from (x. y)
i0-3       Scroll (0: None, 1: Right, 2: Up, 3: Diagonal)

In practice, a runner could be created to show faulty disks and such to the LCD screen. For now, all I have it do is show 'NexentaStor' on bootup.

$ cat /etc/init.d/lcd
#!/bin/bash
echo "E" > /dev/term/b
sleep 0.5
echo "L NexentaStor" > /dev/term/b